


The Paths that Take Us

by makeshiftrolley



Series: skies of heleus [2]
Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Custom Ryder - Freeform, F/F, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-10
Updated: 2017-09-10
Packaged: 2018-12-25 21:19:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12044490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/makeshiftrolley/pseuds/makeshiftrolley
Summary: A collection of my drabbles from tumblr (prompted and unprompted). Pairings are included in the chapter titles so you can skip around.





	1. Mom (No Pairings)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A response to an ask on how Gabriela and Jean would feel when Ellen is thawed and essentially brought back to life. 
> 
> *Lola - honorific for grandmother in Tagalog

Mom sits by the windowsill every time Gabriela visits. She doesn’t talk or acknowledge her presence, even as Gabriela greets her. She simply stares. Gabriela wonders if she looks at anything in particular but she doesn’t care. Mom is here, with her in Andromeda. The doctors say she will take some time to completely heal from her disease, but she will live.

And that’s all that matters.

One afternoon, when Gabriela visits after a long meeting with Tann and the other Pathfinders, her mother finally speaks.

“I shouldn’t be here,” Mom says, still looking out the window. Gabriela wants to ask why but she lets her continue. “I should be dead.”

Gabriela kneels in front of her mother, “Mom, no, you’re not going to die. Mom, we cured you. SAM cured you.” Her voice quivers as she holds back tears.

“Why am I not dead? Why am I still here? Why?”

When her mother looks at her, eyes wild and frantic, Gabriela cries for she has no answers to her father’s selfishness.

–

When she returns to her quarters on the Tempest, she patches a call to Jean.

“I see,” Jean simply says when Gabriela tells him. It’s nighttime on Kadara, and the only source of light in the room is the light emitting from his terminal.

“I don’t understand. We brought her back. Shouldn’t she be happy?”

Jean doesn’t respond, not that she expects an answer from him. She always asks these trivial questions when they talk about Mom.

“Did Mom say anything else?” He asks.

“Why don’t you come here and find out?” Gabriela counters.

“You know I can’t leave Kadara.”

“Then I’ll bring her there,” Gabriela says, “She’ll only be in Ditaeon. I won’t bring her to the Port.”

“No.”

“Why not? She’s your mother, Jean.” Gabriela raises her voice. She’s tired, tired of playing caretaker while Jean plays king on a planet he doesn’t even like. “You haven’t seen Mom since she woke from cryo.”

Jean slams his desk. He stands up, eyebrows furrowed, and his eyes wide. “Because my mother is dead!”

Tears stream down Gabriela’s cheeks. Why? Why are they both like this? Mom and Jean. They’re supposed to be a family again. They’re supposed to be together again. 

Jean slumps back on his chair. He sighs, propping his temple on his fingers. “We sent her ashes to the stars. Lola insisted we should store her urn with the rest of our ancestors in Malolos but Dad insists we send her to the stars.”

“Dad shouldn’t have, he shouldn’t have-” his voice cracks, and he buries his head in his palms. From behind his hands, Gabriela notices he is crying too.

Gabriela breathes. In her head, SAM works to calm her. Their connection over the years that SAM doesn’t need to ask if she wants them to fix her emotions.

When she stops crying and her voice is steady, she says, “You’re right. Dad, shouldn’t have put her into stasis. She was ready to die.”

Her eyes burn but no tears form. SAM is still silently working to soothe her.

“But we cured her. She’s here with us,” she says, “and you can’t keep hiding yourself in Kadara. Please, Jean. I can’t do this by myself anymore. I need you. Mom needs you.”

When Jean doesn’t respond, Gabriela shuts the vid call and crawls to bed. 

Later at night, she doesn’t sleep and orders SAM not to help her.

 

To: Gabriela Ryder  
From: Jean Ryder  
Subject: Hey

I thought about what you said, and you’re right, I shouldn’t have left you alone with her. I’m sorry. It’s just that it’s hard to look at a person you’ve mourned for so many years only to find out that she wasn’t dead after all. I still can’t believe Dad did that, but he was so adamant about trying to fix her. So maybe I should have seen it coming?

Oh and after the funeral, Lola Teresa said to me privately that she shouldn’t have outlived her own daughter. Six hundred years later, she’ll never find out that Mom is alive. 

Shit, sorry if that sounds bad. I’m still trying to process all of this with my fucked up emotions, and whatever it is the Archon did back in Meridian Control. I know it’s been a few years, but that never leaves you, you know? 

Anyway, I’m taking the earliest shuttle to Meridian in the morning. See you there. 

-Jean

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated!
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](thevetranyxs.tumblr.com)


	2. Perfect (Vetra Nyx/Female Ryder)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: height difference kisses where one person has to bend do wn and the other is on their tippy toes

“This is not going to work,” Gabriela complained. Behind the dressing chamber came the sounds of ruffled fabric, cloth being zipped and of course, Gabriela’s yelps.

“Don’t worry, babe,” Vetra assured her from outside the chamber, “you always look good to me.”

Beside Vetra, Suvi giggled. It was she who suggested that Ryder should wear something from her culture to the gala. Not from human culture as a whole, but from the culture of Ryder’s family and her ancestors.

Something Vetra hadn’t known of, ever since her family drifted away from Palaven.

“Okay, I think I’m good,” Gabriela said. The dressing chamber opened, and Gabriela stepped out, her shoes clicking on the ground as she walked.

Vetra couldn’t help but stare. Ryder was wearing a blue gown, the colour matching the skies of Earth. Her sleeves were short and puffed, and a pattern of tiny flowers ran on the side of her dress 

She was breathtaking.

“Ryder, wait right there. I have something for you,” Suvi ordered. She reached for the leather duffel bag behind her chair. Once the bag was on her lap, Suvi took out three items: a flower pin, what looked to be an umbrella made of fiber and a triangular shaped item that Vetra did not recognized.

With the flower pin, she walked over to stand behind Ryder. Suvi twisted her now shoulder length hair into a bun atop her head. Then, she pinned the plastic flower on her bun.

“Now, you look perfect!” Suvi exclaimed, stepping around to have a clear view of Ryder. “Vetra, what do you think?”

Vetra hadn’t realized her mouth was agape. She closed her mouth, her mandibles twitching slightly.

“You…uh…look great?” Vetra stammered, cursing at herself for being inarticulate. 

“No no, you don’t look great,” Ryder tilted her head as Vetra spoke. Her eyebrows furrowed; concern was present in her lovely face. Vetra cursed at herself again. She hated how she could never properly articulate how she felt around Gabriela.

Vetra breathed in, long and hard. She exhaled and said, “What I mean is, you look beautiful. No-” She stopped, then closed in the space between her and Ryder.

“You look gorgeous, magnificent, stunning, breathtaking,” Vetra confessed, taking Ryder’s hands. They always fit perfectly inside of hers, even if her talons weren’t made to hold Ryder’s delicate fingers.

Ryder’s eyes softened. She looked at Vetra as if they were the only people in the room, no in all of Andromeda. She leaned up, curving her body against hers. Vetra followed her movements, leaning down to capture her lips. Like everything about Ryder, her lips were soft, in contrast with the hardness of Vetra’s mouth.

When they broke, Ryder’s shoes hit the floor with a clank. She frowned. Vetra found it rather adorable.

“Do I really have to wear these?” Ryder asked Suvi. She lifted up her skirt, and on her feet were a pair of wooden sandals, secured with a strap inlaid with pearls. Vetra wondered how they were able to find materials to craft the dress and Ryder’s shoes.

“Isn’t it part of your cultural attire?” Suvi retorted, tapping the button of her Omni-tool. A holo of the dress Ryder wore appeared. On the side were a pair of wooden sandals, similar to the ones Ryder had on her feet.

“Yes, but we wear them for cultural fests on the Citadel,” Ryder said, “not for a celebration gala hosted by the Nexus directors.”

“And the umbrella? Or that thing next to it?” Vetra pointed out. She found it odd that an umbrella would be made of lace. It wouldn’t keep them dry.

“Oh this?” Ryder picked up the triangular item. With a flick of her hand, the item spread out into an oddly shaped hemisphere. The item was made out of a fiber that looked similar to the umbrella. It was secured by a wooden handle that followed the shape of the cloth.

“It’s a fan,” Ryder said. She snapped her wrists back and forth, creating air with the fan. “Keeps you cool, but it’s also part of our cultural attire. Same with the umbrella.”

“That doesn’t sound very practical.”

“For a turian, maybe it isn’t,” Ryder laughed, a sound that warmed Vetra’s heart.

“Well…” She closed the fan and tapped it on her chin before she continued. “Maybe, it is. We do come from the tropics after all.”

“For comparison, Vetra,” Suvi piped in cheerily, “the climate in the Philippines is similar to Palaven, without the solar radiation of course.”

“If Palaven experienced typhoons for half of the year, then maybe our homes are similar,” Ryder said, as a matter of fact. She tipped up to press a kiss on Vetra’s chin.

“Oh you know Palaven isn’t my home,” Vetra chuckled.

“Then what is?”

“You.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated!
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](thevetranyxs.tumblr.com)


	3. Tonight (Male Ryder/Reyes Vidal)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompts: moving around while kissing, stumbling over things, pushing each other back against the wall/onto the bed, hands on the other person’s back, fingertips pressing under their top, drawing gentle circles against that small strip of bare skin that make them break the kiss with a gasp and when one stops the kiss to whisper “I’m sorry, are you sure you-” and they answer by kissing them more
> 
> I did all them to some degree.

Tomorrow, Jean would blame it on the alcohol.

Tomorrow, Jean would try to forget how Reyes’ fingers crawled under his shirt and traced the curve of his back. He shivered, breaking the kiss with a gasp before he nipped Reyes’ lip, claiming his mouth again and again.

This was wrong. This was so so wrong.

Reyes spun him in a web of lies so Jean ended what they had. If they even have anything. They were done. They should be.

“I’m sorry,” Reyes stopped. “Are you sure you want-”

Jean didn’t let him finish. He answered by sealing his lips with another kiss. Yes, I want you. He plies Reyes’ mouth open with his tongue. Yes, I want you to make me regret ever leaving you.

Without leaving his mouth, Jean pushed Reyes down on his back. He fumbled with the buttons of his shirt. Once they were all open, Jean ran exploratory fingers on his skin. He was drunk, intoxicated on everything that was Reyes.

Tomorrow, they would act as if there was nothing left between them.

But tonight, maybe just one night, they could have something again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated!
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](thevetranyxs.tumblr.com)


	4. Bayan Ko (No Pairings, Ryder Siblings)

A song familiar to him plays from outside the room. The notes crisp and clear like the first time he has heard it, and the melody, the unspoken cry of a people who have suffered for centuries. It is a hymn too familiar for them, a tune that marks their identity. 

Gabriela plays it slow. Jean imagines her dragging the bow across the strings, letting it sit after every stanza. A pause, to remind them of the struggles their people have faced. Their cruel history still etched on their skins, centuries later.

She crescendos at the last stanza of the song, a final cry of their ancestors that there will always be hope for their future. 

The song finishes, and Jean hears his sister packing away her violin. She exits soon after. 

The hymn still echoes in the backroom. Jean thinks about Kadara, its exiles and its outlaws attempting to establish a government after they left the Initiative, the Angara, fighting an endless war with their own kind and Gabriela, trying her hardest to fill a role that was not meant for her. Gabriela who had to watch their father die, who was alone in a galaxy unfamiliar to her. 

The song was not a cry for their ancestors, but a cry for their hardships in Andromeda. And similar to their ancestors, there is a cry for hope. 

Gabriela is strong- a warrior just as their mother, their grandmothers, and her namesake. She fights, revolting against their perceptions. She leads, finding a new home for humanity, a hope for their future. 

And Jean will make sure she will not fall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bayan Ko - My Country in Tagalog; is also a patriotic song used in protest marches particularly during the Martial Law.
> 
> [tumblr](thevetranyxs.tumblr.com)


End file.
